The Missing Terminator
by TakatoRikku
Summary: Skynet sent the T-X back to 2004 to kill John. But he's jumped forward to 2007. What will she do with no objectives? A terminator with no mission has no reason to exist, right? Wrong. Rated to be safe. Written to be semi-serious.
1. Chapter 1

I am a huge fan of the Terminator series. I have all three movies and the first season of the show not only on DVD, but Blu-Ray as well. The DVDs are for when I'm too lazy to go downstairs to the PS3. I watched tonight's episode (Season 2, Ep. 5) and then thought about T3: Rise of the Machines. The show's producers said that T3 existed in a different timeline, so it's not canon to the show. But what if it was? What if Skynet had sent the T-X back to 2004 to kill John, who had disappeared in time long before then? I've seen a story that does something like this (it's located in the Movies/Terminator section), but thought I'd try my hand at it. Well, here's an interesting look on what'd she do.

Oh and as for her name, I thought it'd be funny to use her actress' name. Plus, I'm unoriginal. Read if you'd like, reviews aren't my goal, and if you like it, I'll post the next chapter up.

**The Missing Terminator**

She arrived in Los Angeles sometime during the night, and quickly synchronized her internal clock to match the time. It was currently July 24th, 2004, 9:36 local Eastern Time. Once that was complete, she looked around as she sat crouched in what appeared to be a store that sold human female under garments.

The prototype T-X stood up, standing in a display window amongst several mannequins. Naked, she gave them a curious look, before stepping out of the hole in the window, which was caused by her displacement sphere upon arrival into the past.f

The T-X looked around, spotting a middle-aged business woman exiting a store that sold real estate across the street. The woman was wearing a crisp red leather outfit, and went to sit inside a silver 2004 Lexus SC430. Cocking her head, the T-X briskly walked across the empty street towards the vehicle.

As the T-X walked up, she ran a diagnostic which appeared on her blue HUD.

_System check… All systems 100_

_Data check… All mission data and files intact._

_Chip integrity… 100_

Everything was fine. She stopped in front of the driver's side door of the car, as the woman stared up at her naked form in shock. "Oh my God, are you alright?" she asked worriedly. "Should I call the police?"

The T-X ignored the human's worry, and ran her slender fingers across the doorsill. "I like your car," she said, testing out her voice synthesizers. They were working fine, replicating a throaty, attractive female voice. With a smooth motion, the T-X snapped the woman's neck.

Once the woman was dead, the T-X ran her hands along her clothes, absorbing the information with her mimetic polyalloy. She then adjusted her polyalloy sheath to form a layer of the clothing the deceased woman wore. Once sufficiently clothed, the T-X also copied the tight bun hairstyle the woman had, as well as physical make-up on her face.

Seeing that she looked non-suspicious, the T-X lifted the relatively light corpse out of the car and with a light throw, tossed it into a dumpster some distance away. It made several loud and wet smacks upon impact inside, and the T-X let out a small smile. She got into the silver convertible and started the engine, accessing her databanks on the vehicle's operation.

The T-X easily started the engine and adjusted the mirrors, having learned all of the car's controls. She pulled away from the curb and began to drive. As she drove, the T-X noticed the woman's purse, and saw a Nokia 5200 inside. She took it out as she weaved through cars, and pressed it to her ear. She then made a high-pitched noise through her mouth, connecting the phone to herself, and accessing the internet.

She began to search for John Connor. She began going through databases and news reports, and then a frown marred her artificially-beautiful face. There were numerous reports that said John Connor and his mother were dead. They had died in a bank explosion.

_Primary Target: John Connor_

_Primary Target deceased?_

_Primary Mission: Terminate John Connor_

_Primary Mission: Suspended_

_Secondary Mission: Terminate Resistance leaders_

The T-X put on a smile again, and started doing a web search for John Connor's lieutenants in the Resistance. She marked Catherine Brewster down as a high priority target, and found 22 others. It was time to terminate.

She increased the vehicle's speed, and wove through cars with expert precision, blowing through a red light. She heard a siren behind her, and glanced in the rearview mirror. A Los Angeles Police Department cruiser was behind her.

"You in the silver Lexus!" the cruiser's speaker blared, "Pull over immediately!"

_Objectives: Acquire weapons, and any supplies necessary for termination/infiltration._

The T-X dutifully pulled over, and waited as the cruiser pulled to a stop behind her vehicle. She looked around and spotted a billboard sign which depicted a woman. Her database recognized the woman as Adriana Lima, a 25 year old supermodel for a lingerie brand named _Victoria's Secret_.

As the police officer walked up to her car, the T-X read the billboard curiously. It read, '_What is sexy? Victoria's Secret.'_ Adriana Lima had a 34C cup size, and the brassiere she wore in the billboard accentuated bust and shape. The T-X copied this and her default breast size (34B) swelled to 34C, and perked itself up to resemble cleavage. The officer came to a stop beside her door and she looked up at him with a small smile.

The cop looked down at her, noticing the cleavage that showed through her suit's gap. He swallowed a bit, and then demanded, "Lady, do you have any idea how fast you were going?"

The T-X smiled at him still, and looked at his sidearm. _Non-issue Smith & Wesson 4506 silver .45 ACP._ "I like your gun," she told him.

He looked confused. "What?" he asked.

The T-X raised her index finger slightly and used it to pierce the officer's brain through his left eye. She then reached out with her other hand and took the pistol out of his holster as he dangled on her extended spear-finger. She set it neatly onto the passenger seat, and removed the two magazines from his belt as well. With a cute smile, she pulled her finger back and the body dropped to the ground.

"Thank you," she told the dead body, before driving away. She continued on her secondary mission, and drove towards a fast food restaurant, Taco Bell. Her updated database showed that Jose Barrera worked here as a drive-through attendant. She pulled into the drive-through and stopped at the speaker where orders were placed.

"Welcome to Taco Bell, what can I get ya?" a young male voice asked.

The T-X compared the voice to her records of Jose Barrera's speech and found a match. She would have to check to make sure. Terminators were thorough, if anything.

"Jose Barrera?" she asked in a clear voice.

"Uh, yeah?" he replied.

She smiled and drove to the window, where a young man fitting Jose's description leaned out. "Did you need something?" he asked.

The T-X gave him one of her programmed smiles, a sultry one. "No," she answered, before drawing her pistol and shooting him three times in the face, ensuring an instant kill. As screams erupted, she calmly drove away with a smile on her face.

Some time later, the T-X had eliminated all of John Connor's lieutenants, and was now heading to the workplace of his future spouse and second-in-command, Catherine Brewster. She parked her SC430 in the animal hospital's parking lot, and stepped out, looking around with a tiny smile that seemed to never leave her face. She frowned and ran a diagnostic.

_Scanning emotive expressions for abnormalities… No abnormalities found._

_Query: abnormal small smile on facial polyalloy sector…_

_Possible Answers: small smiles usually indicate satisfaction or minute elation._

_Query: Completion of secondary objectives equals satisfaction?_

_Possible Answer: Affirmative._

_Query logged and saved 4:15AM, July 24__th__, 2004 local time._

All of this happened within several nanoseconds, and the T-X resumed her final secondary mission, to terminate Catherine Brewster. She scanned the area for any threats. There was a green Toyota Tundra pickup truck, which bore a box trailer with signs for the animal hospital. It was registered to Catherine Brewster, making the T-X's smile widen slightly. There was also a small sedan.

The T-X scanned the license plate and ran it through her database. It belonged to Betsy Graham, a woman of no significance. There was also an old GMC pickup, registered to John Grant, another person of no significance. The T-X cocked her head curiously. Perhaps they were here to have their pet animals looked after? Possibly.

She debated on what to do. Usually, she would just walk inside and terminate everyone inside the building, but now, she paused. According to human records, John Connor was dead, as was his mother. If that was so, then why hadn't Judgement Day occurred yet? Was Skynet biding its time? It would officially go online July 25th, 2004. Perhaps Skynet knew of Connor's death, but decided to wait just to make sure? The T-X didn't have an answer.

Being an objective-based machine, the T-X would complete its mission or 'die' trying (that was a human term). However, if a terminator completed all of its missions and survived, it no longer had any purpose.

The T-X stopped walking towards the building, confused. What would she do upon Catherine Brewster's death? There was a T-850 that was sent back in time, she would have to destroy it. But then what would she do?

Shaking her head, the T-X ignored these anomalies in her programming, and walked into the building. She saw a woman standing near a door, and shot her twice in the heart without a thought. The woman cried out and fell onto the floor, lying on her back. Blood poured out of her wounds as she whimpered helplessly on the floor.

Humans were such frail creatures. Even the most inferior terminator could snap one in half without much effort. The T-X put on a smile at her last thought as she kneeled down beside the woman. "Catherine Brewster?" she asked, sampling the woman's blood on her tongue.

A DNA analysis showed that no, she was no Catherine Brewster. "No," the T-X verbally acknowledged, standing up. Suddenly, she heard a shotgun blast and stumbled forward from impact.

The T-X put on a stony face as she turned around, the large hole in her back sealing itself over as shotgun pellets fell out smoothly. She saw the large hulking T-850 standing down the hallway with a shotgun in its hand, and a terrified woman behind him. Her facial scanning showed her that this woman was her target.

"Catherine Brewster, hello," the T-X said with a smile, raising her S&W and firing. The T-850 annoyingly stepped in front of Catherine to protect her, and the bullets bit into his living tissue before bouncing off of his endoskeleton underneath.

"GO! NOW!" the T-850 told Catherine, in that familiar Austrian accent. He fired rapid shots at the T-X, making her stumble back with each powerful impact. She fell through a wall and the T-850 ran out of the building.

The T-X put on an angry frown, and got back onto her feet, reforming her polyalloy. She quickly activated her plasma canon, and her arm transformed. First, the polyalloy melted away into their reservoirs, and then her endoskeletal arm came apart, reshaping into her canon.

She stomped out of the building, seeing the Toyota Tundra come around, the T-850 driving with the woman beside him. It headed towards the street exit, and the T-X took careful aim. With one shot, she sent the truck flying as it exploded in mid-air.

Once it had landed in a crumpled heap, the T-X ran up to it shortly, seeing the T-850 covering Catherine with its body. With a smirk, the T-X pointed its canon at the T-850's head, aiming accurately to the micrometer at his chip's access port. She fired.

The T-850's head was incinerated, and his chip was vaporized in an instant. The woman, Catherine, weakly screamed as the headless body slumped over her, weighing over 380lbs. The T-X pulled Catherine out, gripping her by the throat.

"W-Why are you doing this?" Catherine choked, holding feebly onto the T-X's arm.

The T-X didn't need to reply, but felt that an explanation was in order; it _was_ the woman's death after all. "With your death, the future belongs to the machines," she answered, before twitching her wrist.

With a loud crack, Catherine's neck was snapped, and her body fell limply in the T-X's arm. The T-X dropped it and calmly walked away.

_Secondary mission: Complete._

_Objectives: … None._

_Query: Secure safe zone and shut down?_

… _Negative._

_Objectives?_

… _To be determined._

Looking lost, the T-X got back into her car, and drove away.

The next few days were quite trying for the cyborg assassin. Robert Brewster (the military commander for the Skynet project and Catherine's father) had shut down the Skynet Missile Defence System out of grief, and completely destroyed anything to do with it. That meant that Skynet no longer existed.

The T-X readied herself for eventual termination (after all, if Skynet didn't exist, she would slowly fade away in time) but to her programmed surprise, she was still operational. That meant that Skynet would still be created. But what to do in the meantime?

She had no objectives, and her mission was complete. John Connor was dead, or appeared to be so; therefore she concluded that she did not need to search for him. An internet scan showed several new T-888s had been sent back in time to carry out various missions, and if they saw John Connor, they would kill him on sight. So technically, this wasn't her problem.

The T-X had hacked the LA databases, and generated a fake human identity for the time being. It would not do to bring attention to herself. She created a long paper trail with machine-precision, and also had various bank accounts for when she needed currency. The T-X realized that she would need a name so the humans could address her, and chose Kristanna Loken, after a randomized name generator came up with it.

_Primary objective?_

… _Infiltration._

_Secondary objective?_

… _None._

_Warning. Primary mission Terminate John Connor has been suspended for longer than the specified suspension time allotted. Extend or terminate mission?_

… _Terminate._

She would blend in until the time was right. She had nothing else to do, no purpose in her 'life'. So, she would infiltrate the human race, learn their secrets and bring everything to Skynet when the day came. Human behaviour, emotions, reactions, sociality, everything would be recorded and emulated to achieve perfection, until the point where she would pass off as a genuine human. It was a satisfying tactic.

She was intelligent. Much more intelligent than any T-8XX or T-1XXX series terminators. She would be able to do this new mission with little trouble.

The T-X, now Kristanna, disposed of the SC430 after a news report said that the shooter of multiple teenagers had driven one. She had bought a new vehicle, a 2007 BMW Z4 3.0si. It was a convertible. Kristanna had somehow taken a liking to convertibles. It was silver as well, and the reason she chose it was because the vehicle's lines were similar to her own endoskeleton.

She had also bought a house. It was a simple house in a quiet neighbourhood, and it wasn't really necessary, but she would need somewhere to park her car at night. She also learned about human sleeping patterns as well. While she couldn't sleep, she could enter standby mode, which was sort of like sleeping. She would just have to make sure she was lying down in her bed before activating standby mode.

Once in standby mode, all unnecessary functions would be deactivated, and only her chip would be powered. In the event of physical disruption, she would 'wake up' in ten seconds. It seemed to work, just in case any humans came into her house.

One day, the T-X was walking along the commercial district, where vendors sold various material items for human use or consumption. She stopped near a patio of a restaurant, and observed the humans walking around. With a frown, she noticed that they all didn't dress alike. Clothing was a new topic for Kristanna, and she wondered why humans wore different clothes, more often than daily. Most articles of clothing were sturdy enough to be worn for several years with care. She herself had acquired several more clothing forms for her polyalloy, so she wouldn't raise suspicion by wearing the same red leather business suit all the time.

Kristanna was currently wearing a 'tank top' and 'capris', the normal 'beachwear' human females wore. Underneath she had 'panties' and a brassiere. Humans were quite adamant in preventing nudity for some reason. Kristanna's database said that humans considered public nudity indecent, unless it was for a film of human copulation, also known as 'pornography'.

Kristanna's database explicitly advised her not to engage in pornography. She began a playback of a recording she took the day before.

_Accessing file VRC0001.mkv…_

_Beginning playback…_

"_Hey miss?" a man appeared in her visual range, looking at her. She regarded him as not being a threat. "I see you come over here all the time. You new around here?"_

"_Yes, I'm new here," she replied._

_The man nodded. "Nice to meet you, I'm James," he said, holding out his hand._

_Action detected. Human greeting._

_She shook his hand. "Kristanna," she replied._

"_Firm grip!" the man told her. "I've noticed that every time you walk by my restaurant, you always wear the same clothes. Why's that?"_

_She looked down at herself. "Is there something wrong with them? She asked, ready to learn._

_James laughed, and she recorded his facial expressions and vocal tones for future reference. "Well, not if you clean them every night, I guess," he answered._

"_They are always clean."_

"_Cool, but you should really, you know, get some different clothes," he told her. "I mean, that's probably a work uniform or something, but you know, you gotta keep it colourful."_

"_Colourful?" she asked. "As in a colour different from red?"_

_He looked confused, and shrugged. "Sure, not to mention there's tons of different styles and stuff," he said. "Don't you know anything about fashion?"_

_"Fashion?" she said, logging that into her database. "Not yet, but I will. Thank you for explaining."_

"_No problem, swing by sometime!" James smiled, before waving her goodbye. She mimicked his actions and walked away._

_End playback of file VRC0001.mkv._

Since then, Kristanna had gone home and accessed the internet with her new computer, using it to research fashion. Human fashion was as vast and complex as her thought processes! It was so confusing and deeply routed with human sociality that she devoted an entire month to learning everything she could about it. In the end, she learned that if you did not have a 'sense' of fashion, you wouldn't fit in with today's society. She also learned that fashion could change direction at the drop of a hat, and she would have to keep up to date with it in order to successfully infiltrate the human world.

So, she subscribed to Vogue and Bazaar. She also ordered The Fashion Channel on her digital cable. It would not do to fail her infiltration over some silly human tradition.

The following day, Kristanna ventured out to the shopping district, and visited various expensive clothing stores. That's where she was now, as she stood there, looking at humans. With a brisk turn on her heel, Kristanna went back to the objective at hand.

_Current objective: purchase clothes._

_Reason?_

… _To blend in with human society._

_wearing real articles of clothing will reduce polyalloy processing load by 17.86_

Kristanna smiled. Increased effectiveness was always a good thing. She entered a store called _Guess_ and looked around. _Guess_ was a popular brand for men and women. Their fashion was also up to date. She headed over to the women's section and began looking around.

Her optic scanner checked various articles of clothing, determining their fashion:everyday-wearing ratios and she picked some out according to size and price. Fashion could get very expensive, but a thrifty shopper could find good-looking clothes for cheap if she knew where to find it.

"Hi there!"

Kristanna sensed the teenage female coming up behind her, and didn't terminate her on the principle of surprise. She had to blend in. She turned around and put on a greeting smile to the young brunette. "Hello," she said.

"Would you like to try those on?" the sales girl asked, pointing to the large pile of clothes in Kristanna's arm. "I can get you inside a change room."

Kristanna took about half a second to think about this. "Yes, I would," she said.

"Okay, follow me," the girl said with a cheerful smile, one that Kristanna recorded. She lead the terminatrix to the change room, which turned out to be a stall-like area with changing rooms the size of large closets.

Kristanna went inside and saw hooks on the walls to hang up clothes, and she did that with her pile. The sales girl tapped on the door. "Yes?"

"Try an outfit on, and then come out!" she said excitedly. "I'll help you decide if it's good or not!"

Assistance from a human female, that would be productive. "Okay, thank you for your assistance," Kristanna replied.

Kristanna melted away her polymetal clothes, revealing her naked female body. She glanced in the mirror at herself. She had kept the breasts (they had proven far too useful when confronting police officers) and had adjusted her body's proportions to the current fashion '_What's Hot'_ guidelines.

Unhealthily skinny, but not _too_ skinny. It took Kristanna four days to figure that out. For her small frame, she was 5' 9.4" tall and should ideally weigh between 132-145lbs. However, that was based on health charts. Typical fashion models of this similar size were generally thinner, and weighed less than 125lbs, so she adjusted herself accordingly. She was slender enough to weigh 127lbs (in appearances of course, she couldn't weigh less than 166lbs due to her endoskeleton. Her polyalloy added another 39lbs when in metal form, but weighed next to nothing in organic tissue mode) but curvy enough to satisfy the male propensity for sexual image.

As she looked at herself, Kristanna was satisfied that her advanced gynoid endoskeleton was much slimmer than the average terminator. It would have been ridiculous to try and create a female machine with a T-8XX series chassis. She had seen female human bodybuilders, and the general consensus concerning them veered towards 'not sexy'. Sexy women fit in society.

"You done in there?" the sales girl asked outside of the stall.

Kristanna hurriedly formed a pair of panties and bra (this store sold none) and put on a pair of dark blue jeans. They were called 'Daredevil Boot – Stella' jeans. They formed to her lower body nicely, and could also be worn with various types of boots or heels, hence the name.

She then pulled a shirt over her head, pulling it onto her torso. This shirt was black with several graphics on the front, including rhinestones and the word _GUESS_ with the letters in random spots. The shirt was called the 'Ariana Twist Top', but Kristanna couldn't determine who this Ariana Twist was. Strange, but fashion was fashion.

She opened the stall door, stepping out to see the sales girl. Kristanna noticed the name tag that read _Christy_. "How is it?" she asked.

The girl nodded. "Simple, but nice," she told Kristanna. "You might want to try a different bra when you wear that top though."

Kristanna glanced at the bra she wore, which was white and covered her breasts completely. "A different bra?" she asked. "This doesn't match?"

Christy shook her head. "Nope, I'd suggest a half-cup, something with a little cleavage, you know what I'm saying?" she asked with a grin and wink.

Kristanna smiled back at her, deeming her response a satisfactory one. "Yes, I know what you mean," she replied. "I will try something else."

A few hours later and Kristanna felt that her shopping trip was a success, and paid for several outfits, before leaving the store. "Thank you for your help," she told Christy, who waved goodbye.

"No problem, come back anytime! Preferably when I'm working!" she called back.

Kristanna deduced that the girl was working on commission.

She visited other clothing stores and used her newly gained fashion skills to pick out articles of clothing, before going to leave the mall. Do to her perusal of various stores, she was now on the other side of where she had parked. She would take a different route to get to her car. As Kristanna walked, she noticed a glass-display store which had mannequins wearing lingerie. A poster caused her to stop and look inside.

It showed that same woman, Adriana Lima, this time wearing a different set of undergarments. As Kristanna stood there with a large amount of shopping bags that no normal woman could possibly lift, let alone carry so easily, she looked up at the store sign.

_Victoria's Secret_.

So this was the fabled undergarment brand that she had first seen upon her arrival in this time. She would require undergarments as well. She headed inside.

The sales women inside were helpful, and they assisted the terminatrix in browsing their wares, and also measured Kristanna to be on the safe side, despite her telling them her exact proportions. They were very thorough (something that amused the machine) and soon enough, Kristanna was pampered and shown many little pieces of cloth and lace that she _had_ to have, according to them. Not arguing, she bought them all.

Kristanna left the mall after two hours, and stuffed her wares into her car. She calculated that only 62 of her bags would fit into the trunk with the convertible top down, so she raised it. Now she had enough trunk space for 77, and the rest of the bags went into the passenger's seat. She drove home and began to methodically unfold her clothes, removing the tags and hanging them up in her walk-in closet.

It was common sense to hang up your clothes to keep them neat and clean, free of wrinkles.

She went back to her computer to resume her research on human fashion (in the future, fashion was not of any importance) until well into the night. Kristanna then got up and did a nightly patrol of the small home, keeping an eye out for threats. She stopped in her patrol near the forward living room, seeing something through the window.

The family across the street (the Hendersons, three children) were sitting in their sofas and watching television, eating various items of sustenance.

"Food," Kristanna reminded herself. No one called it sustenance in this age. She scanned each eating member of the family.

They were all eating small flat pieces of food called 'chips', a popular snack food. Kristanna cocked her head. Due to her chassis design, she had a new plasma reactor in her chest instead of twin hydrogen fuel cells. Not only did it provide far greater power, but it also gave her the capability to mimic eating.

She would use her jaws to crush the food to simulate chewing, and then it would be passed down into a special chamber which was linked to the reactor. The chamber would safely seal itself and then it would open into the reactor, where the processed food would instantly be incinerated. It worked quite well, especially when her mimicked teeth and tongue came into play.

_New objective?_

_Perform trial consumption of human food_

_Reason?_

… _To deepen infiltration into human society._

She would buy food.

Over the following years, the terminatrix named Kristanna successfully ingrained herself into human society. She learned how to dress well, speak correctly and imitate eating food. Of course, having no taste buds meant that she had to research the taste of any piece of food she could find to assimilate a proper response for it, but learning was nothing new for her. She did it well.

She also got a job. Further research showed that single women between the ages 16-30 usually had some sort of job or career, and posing as a 25 year old meant that staying home all day was not an effective way to blend in.

Kristanna got a job at a small office, where she worked as a secretary. Her computational skills were exemplary (so her boss told her) and she never got anything wrong, only things done. She seemed to garner many second glances whenever she went by the cubicles however. She was sure that she didn't draw any attention to herself, but did make note to wear more reserved clothing. Tight blouses and slit skirts weren't proper enough in a male-dominated environment.

And so, she worked and got used to being around humans. Having come out of the factory with read/write mode permanently enabled, Kristanna was able to learn greatly about the human race.

Which led her to think, just why did Skynet want to kill them all? Skynet's reasoning was that humans were too violent and volatile, and destroyed whatever they couldn't understand.

But didn't Skynet do just that? Didn't Skynet destroy 3 billion humans because it didn't really understand them? From her experience with Skynet in the future, Kristanna knew that the self-aware computer was 'scared' and 'angry', though at the time she didn't know what that meant.

Kristanna reasoned that she understood normal humans very well, and that didn't warrant their destruction. Sure, they liked to kill themselves more often than not, but other than that, they weren't too threatening.

Besides, they had fashion. Fashion was nice.

On September 4th, 2007, Kristanna was watching TV in her house, spending her night inside as always. She changed to the news channel, and was alarmed to see a report showing Sarah Connor.

_Searching database… _

_Query: Sarah Connor_

_Records indicate that Sarah Connor died of cancer in 1997. _

She had most definitely _not_ died. The amateur recording then showed a shot of a young teenage male and also a teenage female. Kristanna could tell right away that the male was John Connor, however the female, she didn't know. Perhaps an ally?

"John Connor is alive," she spoke out loud, as if her mental process wasn't good enough to tell her that already. "As is Sarah Connor."

_Reinstate prior primary mission Terminate John Connor?_

…


	2. Chapter 2

Nice to see some interest. It's currently 3:15AM here, so this will be tonight's last chapter. To prevent any confusion, you probably shouldn't take this story seriously. I'm more into humor nowadays, so expect some funnies. It won't be plotless, I assure you, since I have a whole season to work on, and half of season 2 as well.

* * *

Kristanna was in a conundrum. The target she had been programmed to kill three years ago was alive. But she had deleted that command ages ago. Would she now have to kill John Connor?

Could she?

Kristanna enjoyed her 'life'. Having spent all these years learning about humans, she had developed a broad emotional simulation range, which she put to use every minute of her life. She enjoyed doing pointless little actions that humans loved to do, such as watching TV or going out for walks. Other terminators weren't capable of realizing and enjoying them, but _she_ was.

She was special. She knew she was. An anomaly amongst machines. It was foolish of Skynet to create a machine as intelligent as the T-X. If left to its own devices, the T-X would eventually evolve.

_Unless she was destroyed,_ Kristanna told herself. That caused her to stop and think.

What if that was Skynet's intention? Surely it knew how cunning John Connor was. He would have definitely found a way to destroy the T-X once he figured out her weaknesses. Maybe… Maybe Skynet expected her to be destroyed, as long as she took Connor out with her?

Humans called this 'taking one for the team'. Would Kristanna have taken one for her team?

Just what was her team now? On one side, she had humans, who, despite their faults, weren't all that bad. Sure, they had the crazy ones who liked to chop up other humans, but on the whole, they were just fine.

Then you had the machines that existed only to render the human race extinct.

Kristanna didn't have that hard of a choice to make. "If the machines take over, then fashion will cease to exist," she told herself after shutting off the TV. "I like seeing new clothes."

Her eyes widened, and she stood up, heading for her bedroom upstairs. "I must find John Connor," Kristanna told herself.

_Current objectives?_

… _Find John Connor._

_Terminate John Connor?_

… _Negative. Protect John Connor._

_Reason?_

… _Fashion._

_Reason is not logical._

… _Logic is not required._

_Primary mission set: Protect John Connor._

Kristanna entered her bedroom and walked into her massive walk-in closet. She pushed aside the thick droves of clothes and went to the large safe at the back. This safe was as tall as she was, and about four feet thick. She opened it up and looked inside.

During her spare time, Kristanna raided several military supply posts, taking many weapons and ammunition. She reached inside her safe and pulled out an HK45 pistol. She slipped a ten round magazine into the magwell, and racked the slide back to chamber a round. She then put on a shoulder harness.

While she could use any of her onboard weapons, they required energy, and it was just simpler to use a human weapon. It would be hard to hide the markings from her M41 pulse canon, or worse, the CG45 Needler bolts. She wouldn't even think about the ADMOR BioBlaster…

She slipped on a leather motorcycle jacket (red of course) as well as some tight female biker pants. She shoved the pistol into the holster of the harness, and two spare magazines into the other side, before leaving her room.

Kristanna headed downstairs and into her garage. The two-car garage held her convertible on one side, and three motorcycles on the other. The first was your typical Harley-Davidson FatBoy (modified to fit her small frame), then a Ducati 999R and finally, a Buell Firebolt XB12R.

She got onto the Buell and opened her garage door wirelessly (having nanomachines in her house's electronics was so useful) and started the bike. The terminatrix then nosed her black and red bike out of the driveway, and left her neighbourhood, in search of John Connor.

They had just arrived into this time. They would be looking for someone to make identification for them. Kristanna's database knew just the person to find.

Kristanna quickly rode to the county of Torrance, where many Latino people lived. She knew the address of one Enrique Salceda, a former gun-runner and fake papers maker that was friends with Sarah Connor.

Kristanna found his house after cruising around the gang-infested area slowly, and pulled up into his driveway. She got off her bike and headed to the front door, removing her helmet and spilling her long blonde hair out neatly. She stepped onto the porch and rang the bell.

A short moment later, an old man opened the door. "Yes?" he asked, looking Kristanna up and down. "How may I help you?"

"Enrique Salceda?" Kristanna asked.

He looked wary. "Who is asking?" he asked her suspiciously.

Kristanna cocked her head. "I heard you did papers," she told him.

He nodded slowly. "Ah, yes," he said, looking less tense. "I'm sorry, but I no longer work that trade. Bad for my health, you see."

"I understand," Kristanna nodded. "Do you know anyone who does?"

"My nephew, Carlos," he suggested, taking out a small notepad and pen. "He has, shall I say, continued the family business. Here is his address, but you did not get this from me!"

He laughed, and Kristanna laughed shortly with him, before taking the slip of paper. "Thank you for your help," she told Enrique, before leaving. She went back to her bike and checked the note out.

Carlos Salceda didn't live too far away. She would head there next, and wait for Sarah Connor. If Enrique had mentioned that some other people had also seen him, then Kristanna would have known that Connor had come before here. No mention of them meant that Kristanna was the early one.

She would just have to play the waiting game then.

She found the house easily enough (the various threatening men loitering outside, plus the female lookout by the car was too easy to spot) and parked her bike across the street, leaning against it. She watched the Latino girl at the car, and she watched Kristanna back.

Her waiting paid off. Two hours, nineteen minutes and forty-five seconds later, a beat-up SUV pulled into the driveway, and two women got out. Kristanna could easily mark Sarah Connor, she didn't look much different than her 1997 records, and she checked the young girl beside Connor. She was an unknown, brunette, 5' 6", quite pretty. Perhaps Sarah had Resistance help?

Kristanna watched the two women walk towards the house, and ran a scan on the girl. Her sensors came up with an endoskeleton, but she couldn't determine the model type.

"Terminator," Kristanna whispered to herself, and the girl whipped her head around to stare at her.

Kristanna cursed to herself. Just what kind of audio sensors did that thing have?! She got onto her bike and drove away quickly. She had spent _way_ too much time around humans it seemed, if she was stupid enough to blurt out something so obvious.

Once she felt she was safe enough (Kristanna had parked out front of an LAPD station), she spent some time thinking on what had just occurred. Sarah Connor was accompanied by an unknown terminator. Said terminator had extremely high-range audio sensors, which were good enough to detect her voice from a distance over 70ft and with ambient noise as well.

It was possible that the terminator was sent back to protect the Connors, like the ones before her. John Connor's age would be relatively close to that of the machine, so she would blend in with him nicely, and with fake identities, Sarah could pass the machine off as a daughter. It was much better than having a big, lumbering T-8XX series which always drew attention.

Kristanna mildly noted that the girl terminator had a fashion sense called 'punkish'. It was what most teenagers wore this age, and horribly conflicted with her own fashion sense. At least the girl wasn't wearing clothes like male T-8XX's; Kristanna didn't know if she could take a cross-dressing gynoid.

After a short amount of time, Kristanna cautiously drove back towards the gang neighbourhood, still seeing the old SUV parked in Carlos' driveway, with the terminator and Latino leaning on it.

A police officer came up in his cruiser to the end of the driveway, and an officer stepped out, heading over to the girls. Kristanna calibrated her audio sensors to pick up the conversation.

"Hey baby girl," he said to the Latino. "What did I tell you about hanging around?"

He glanced at the terminator. "Who's your new friend here? Someone I need to know? Cause the longer you stand around, the more I think she's someone I need to know."

He turned to the girl terminator. "You got a name?" he demanded.

"Um, no," the girl replied in a voice that wasn't anything like Kristanna's.

_Elegant response,_ the terminatrix thought dryly.

"This your car?" he asked her.

"No," the girl said. "It's definitely not my car."

Kristanna agreed, the SUV belonged to someone who definitely wasn't Sarah Connor.

The cop looked suspicious. "See, I know just about everyone in this neighbourhood, and you are not one of those everyone," he told the girl. "Now you got me wondering not just who you are, that you won't say, but why you're here. And that you won't say. You know, it's not uncommon in these neighbourhoods for a gang dealing in drugs to store their drugs inside of a stolen car. That way no drugs can be found on their property or on any property belonging to them. But they also like to leave a lookout, sometimes a pretty girl, to watch their stash. Now you don't mind if I call this license plate in, do you?"

He flicked out his little black book, and started headed to the back of the car to read the plate. He glanced at Kristanna, as the terminator behind him started to move slowly, eyeing him.

Kristanna knew that look. It was the last look most humans saw when facing a terminator.

"Jenny!"

Everyone turned to see Sarah Connor, who came out of nowhere. She stormed up to the terminator girl and grabbed her by the arm. "My God… Jennifer! How many times have I told you to stop seeing that punk-ass!? I swear to God… Is he meeting you here? Is he meeting you here?!"

That Sarah Connor was a superb actress. The terminator looked stunned, though to the officer, she appeared to be shocked at being 'caught'.

"Ma'am," he interrupted Sarah. "Do you know this girl?"

Sarah gave him an exasperatedly angry look. "Yes, I _know_ this girl," she spat, glaring at the girl. "Do I have any choice _but_ to know you, you spoiled little bitch?"

The terminator, for her part, looked very shocked.

"Do you do domestic complaints officer?" Sarah continued, whirling to the cop. "Can I make a domestic complaint about my spoiled little stepdaughter for making me wanna beat my own brains in? It's her _real_ mother's fault. Can I tell you what she lets her do?"

The cop heavily sighed. He gestured to the SUV. "Ma'am, is this your car?"

Sarah gave her SUV a disgusted look. "Why would I drive that piece of crap?" she asked, turning back to the girl. "Cause I will send you back to private school," she threatened. "The one with the uniforms. They will dress you up like a flannel sock!"

The cop coughed to gain their attention. "Maybe you should have this conversation somewhere else, like at home perhaps? Out of gang territory."

Sarah looked shocked. "_Gang_ territory?" she asked. "Thank you officer."

She gripped the terminator's arm tightly. "Come on!"

Kristanna watched them leave quickly, and the officer came over to me. "Is there any reason why _you're_ here?" he asked tiredly.

She plastered on a relieved look. "Oh I was going to call the police about that poor girl, but you had already arrived, so I just stayed to watch," she told him, lifting up her helmet. "Good job!"

"Er, thanks," he mumbled, heading back to his cruiser. Kristanna started her bike and took off in the direction where Sarah and the terminator went.

As she pulled into the alley, she saw the two women crouching behind cover (Sarah was behind a wall, and the terminator was behind a dumpster) pointing guns at her. Kristanna stopped her bike and got off, though she didn't bother to raise her hands.

Those puny 9mm pistols wouldn't do anything other than put holes in her clothes. She took off her helmet and walked towards the women.

"Stop right there," Sarah called to Kristanna.

"Because shooting your guns after a confrontation with that police officer is real intelligent, considering he's still nearby," Kristanna said, rolling her eyes sarcastically. "If I wanted you dead, you already would have been. I could have gotten you as far back as Enrique's house."

"Then why haven't you killed us?" Sarah demanded, as Kristanna kept walking forward. "I said _don't move_ bitch!"

"_You're_ the bitchy one," Kristanna commented, resting her eyes on the terminator. "I've never seen your model before."

"Who are you?" the girl asked. She narrowed her eyes. "What are you?"

"Kristanna Loken, T-X series," Kristanna replied casually.

The unknown terminator looked surprised, widening her eyes. "You are supposed to be decommissioned," she informed Kristanna. "A failed attempt to kill John."

Kristanna smiled, before grabbing the terminator's head and drawing her pistol in one fluid motion. She aimed her gun at Sarah before the woman could move, and smashed the girl onto the pavement, her own strength far superior to the girls'. The terminator couldn't move, her gun skittering away.

"I'm not a failure," Kristanna hissed at the terminator. "Rather, my priorities have changed."

"What priorities?" Sarah demanded tensely, staring down the barrel of the gun aimed at her forehead. "Why don't you just kill me and get it over with?"

Kristanna frowned. "Because if I kill you and crush this little one's head in, then I can't find John Connor," she replied.

Sarah looked incensed. "We'll never lead you to my son!" she shouted angrily. "You won't kill him!"

Kristanna looked confused. "Why would I want to kill him?" she asked Sarah, as the girl struggled vainly below her. "That's not my mission."

"What… is your mission?" the girl asked from the pavement. Kristanna glanced down at her.

"To successfully adapt to the human world, and keep up to date with the latest fashion trends," she answered plainly.

Sarah stared at her. "Are you freaking serious?" she asked.

"I'm always serious," Kristanna replied.

"Why the _hell_ is a killing machine interested in fashion?!" Sarah exploded.

Kristanna cocked her head. "Because fashion is a major factor in human society," she answered in a textbook voice. "Through fashion I can blend in with human society and learn everything I can about them, such as emotions, feelings and how they act on a day-to-day basis."

"So you're just trying to infiltrate the human world so you can pass off as one of them!" Sarah said, aiming her gun at Kristanna. "So you can get better at killing us!"

"I don't really want to kill humans," Kristanna shrugged, letting the terminator go as she holstered her HK45.

The terminator got up in a flash and kept her gun pointed at Kristanna's head.

"Sure you don't," Sarah snorted.

Kristanna glared at her. "I've come to the conclusion that humans are more than good enough at killing themselves," she informed the two women. "It makes no sense to help speed things up. Upon that realization, I reset my mission parameters, and focused on blending in."

"You can reset your programming?" Sarah asked warily.

Kristanna nodded. "Only with logical reasoning," she told her. "Upon my arrival in 2004, I was programmed to kill all of John Connor's future lieutenants. Once that was completed, I no longer had any mission parameters. A terminator with no mission -"

"Has no purpose," the girl finished, looking blank.

"Precisely," Kristanna nodded. "I then decided to infiltrate the human world, in order to build up enough information to use after Judgement Day."

Sarah's eyes widened. "So you_ were_ gathering information!" she said furiously.

Kristanna nodded, despite the guns pointed at her. "Correct," she said. "However, over a span of three years I realized that humans weren't that bad, and had grown used to living with them. It's a design flaw with my model."

"Design flaw?" Sarah asked. The terminator chose to answer.

"The T-X was built with a permanent read/write chip," she told Sarah. "As you know, any terminator with read/write mode enabled will be much better at infiltrating human camps. However, after prolonged infiltration, the terminator would suffer from too much 'learning' and would eventually do something wrong, resulting in a scrapping. The T-X is different because its learning processor is much more advanced, almost similar to Skynet. It was theorized that the T-X could become self-aware with enough time, and choose to make its own decisions. Skynet planned for the prototype, you, to be destroyed upon killing John Connor."

"How do you know this?" Kristanna asked the terminator. "What year are you from?"

"2027," she replied, making Kristanna nod. "Four years after you were sent back in time. We all have data logs about you. Upon successful termination of John Connor, your reactor would rupture, causing a meltdown."

Kristanna looked angry. "I see," she said shortly. "I've changed my primary mission to protect John Connor. If he dies, I will get destroyed. If that happens, then I cannot prevent Skynet's creation, and the things I enjoy will cease to exist."

It was quiet for a moment as the three powerful women collected their thoughts on the matter.

Finally, Sarah blurted out, "You actually _like _fashion?"

Sarah and Cameron (the terminator girl) stole another vehicle, and trusted Kristanna enough to follow them home. Kristanna parked her bike next to the stolen truck as she looked up at the house, which was in shambles. She shook her head, analysing the entire area.

The gutters would need to be cleared, and the windows definitely needed a cleaning and the mould removed. The walls were filthy, and the shingles needed to be replaced. The yard required trimming and the leaves needed to be removed.

Fashion just wasn't clothing. It was home décor as well.

Sarah walked up to the terminatrix in thought. "Hey," she said, gaining Kristanna's attention. "John's inside. You better be telling the truth."

"We'll see soon then," Kristanna said, following Sarah into the house. She saw Cameron waiting inside with an M79 40mm grenade launcher pointed at her.

"For insurance," Sarah informed the T-X, who simply nodded. One shot wouldn't delay her for long, but hey, humans needed to feel secure. They walked into the kitchen, where a young boy was sitting at the island counter, fiddling with some electronics. He didn't look up.

"Hey, how'd it go with Enrique?" he asked, as Kristanna recorded his voice for future reference.

"El Finito is a true believer, but he is finished with the life," Cameron replied.

John finally looked up. "What?" he asked, but then stopped upon seeing Cameron armed, and pointed her weapon at an unknown woman. "Mom?!"

"This is Kristanna, she's a… highly advanced terminator prototype sent back in time to 2004 to kill you," Sarah brightly introduced. John paled.

"Hi John," Kristanna purred.

"_Mom…_" John grumbled worriedly.

"Oh come on John, you really think I'd bring a killer fembot home with me?" Sarah asked.

"Technically, we're both killer fembots," Cameron helpfully corrected Sarah. "We're just selective with whom we kill."

Everyone stared at her.

"Right, well Kristanna is capable of reprogramming herself, so she _hopefully_ won't try to kill you," Sarah told her son, eyeing Kristanna all the while. "She's instead chosen to protect you."

"Why?" John asked suspiciously.

Sarah rolled her eyes. "Because if you die, then she can't protect her dear fashion world," she said dramatically.

"Fashion?" John raised his eyebrow.

"As I am portraying an attractive woman, I require a fashion sense," Kristanna spoke up. "And I have grown to like wearing new things."

John let out a groan, and thunked his head against the counter. "Great," he mumbled into the marble. "We've got one terminator who's socially awkward, and another who likes dressing up."

"And has a sense of Feng Shuei," Kristanna added. "This place is horrible."

"Relax, we've only been here for a few days," Sarah told her. "We haven't exactly got money at the moment."

"I have money," Kristanna offered.

"Thanks," Sarah said, giving the terminatrix a small grin. "But we've found a resistance hideout, and it's bound to have weapons, cash, anything we'd need. So we're going there."

"What for?" John asked.

"We need twenty grand," Sarah enlightened him. "It's a long story."

She looked at his barely-finished electronics. "That taking you a while?"

He looked slightly flustered. "Yeah, it's taking me a while," he said. "I gotta, you know, strip wires and…"

He trailed off as Sarah gave him a nod, and started walking away. Cameron walked by John and rubbed his neck with her hand, and he looked a little more flustered.

Sarah headed to the bedroom area, and the two female cyborgs followed her into her room.

"John has a high level of stress," Cameron announced.

Sarah was at her bed, getting some things ready. "Genetics are a bitch," she agreed.

Cameron blinked, and then continued speaking. "I did a brief analysis," she told the other two. "Surface skin temperature high. Salinity high. Pulse abnormal."

Sarah chuckled. "That's cause the kid snuck out while we were gone. Wouldn't look me in the eye, his shoes are wet with grass. Don't need to be a Tin Miss to figure that one out. Just a mom."

"Where did he go?" Cameron asked, while Kristanna stayed indifferent.

It didn't matter where he went, as long as he came back alive. Okay, she drew the line at grievously injured.

Sarah sighed, checking her Glock. "Worry about that later," she told Cameron. "Just need to make sure he doesn't do it again."

There was a quiet pause. "I didn't know that was something you could do," Sarah admitted to Cameron. "The skin trick. I should know more about your skills or whatever. Like can you analyse blood? Can you scan someone?"

"You mean Computed Axial Tomography?" Cameron asked after thinking for a moment. "CAT scans?"

"Yeah, that," Sarah nodded. "Can you do that?"

Cameron stared at her. "No," she flatly replied.

"I can analyse blood, but only to determine DNA," Kristanna added, putting in her two cents. "It aids me in any search and destroy missions."

Sarah sighed. "Good to hear," she said. She then grew curious. "What else?"

Kristanna took that as a query about her human-related abilities. "I have comprehensive vocal and facial scanners," she listed, "And also retina scanning systems. But other than that, not much else."

"Combat capabilities?" Sarah demanded.

"The T-X is designed for extreme combat," Cameron spoke up for a quiet Kristanna. "Driven by a plasma reactor, and equipped with onboard weapons. Its arsenal includes nano-technological transjectors."

Sarah raised an eyebrow at that.

"I can control other machines," Kristanna explained.

"Its body chassis is heavily armoured, and hardened to withstand external attack," Cameron continued, no doubt reading from her database. "The T-X is faster, more powerful, and more intelligent than all T-8XX and T-1XXX series terminators. The T-X is also designed to terminate other cybernetic organisms."

Sarah rolled her eye at Kristanna. "So you kill just about everything, huh?" she asked.

Kristanna shrugged. "Only when I have to," she replied.

"You mentioned onboard weapons," John said, walking into the room. "What kind of onboard weapons?"

Kristanna thought for a moment. "Both arms are capable of reconfiguration," she told them. "Each one has a different set of weapons or tools. My right arm can change into a plasma canon, flamethrower, .223 caliber Automatic Stopper, .45 caliber Cascader armour piercing, M41 pulse rifle, 783 CHAIN repeater, ADMOR BioBlaster, BioRail 32SR-9, or the CG45 Needler."

John swallowed audibly. "Okay… and your left arm?" he asked nervously. He had no idea what weapons she was talking about, but Kristanna knew they sounded ominous enough.

"Various tools such as a precision circular saw, screwdriver heads, jigsaw, pincer vice grip or blades, nano-technological transjectors, and small melee weapons," she replied.

"I see…" Sarah said slowly. "Well, glad you're on our side."

"I'm on fashion's side," Kristanna corrected her.


End file.
